Tallahassee, Florida - Governor Ron DeSantis has been sitting in second place to Donald Trump for most of the Republican presidential primary race, but his opponent Vivek Ramaswamy is quickly rising in popularity, making him a threat going forward.

Is Ron DeSantis' camp homing in on Vivek Ramaswamy?

In audio obtained by Politico, Jeff Roe, the leader of the DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down, held a private meeting with a group of donors hours before last month's GOP debate where he said that if Ramaswamy has "a big night," it could be "not great for us, short term."

He went on to assure the group that the PAC was aggressively fighting back.

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"Everything you read about [Vivek] is from us," Roe told the group. "Every misstatement, every 360 he’s conducting or 180 that he is going through in life, is from our scrutiny and pressure. And so, he's not going to go through that very well, and that will get worse for him."

It seems his camp may have widespread fears over Ramaswamy's rise, as before the debate, a group backing the Florida governor advised him to "take a sledgehammer" to the entrepreneur.

Ramaswamy went on to exceed expectations at the debate and arguably steal the show.

According to a post-debate poll from The Washington Post, 29% of polled viewers felt that DeSantis performed the best, but Ramaswamy followed closely at 26%.

Roe went on to say that he is confident Ron DeSantis will defeat the party's front-runner Donald Trump in the first two voting states - New Hampshire and Iowa.